Isolation
by dragonprincess1988
Summary: Tim has some time to think over things.


_Jealousy is reflective of a person's feelings or attitudes toward another person, whereas envy expresses a person's feelings or attitudes toward another person's advantages or accomplishments. Jealousy pertains to emotional rivalry while envy is resentment of a more fortunate person. _

That's what the lovely dictionary tells me anyway. Not like it matters. If you feel one of those, you usually feel the other. I'm tired of people, mainly the ones that I'm supposed to call my friends, telling me they are jealous or envious of my intelligence. Really, what am I supposed to say to that? "Oh, yeah…me too." Somehow, I don't foresee that going over well. And I certainly have no intention of telling those people that I'm truly jealous and envious of them, which is completely true.

I envy how easy it is for others to just belong. They don't know what it's like to be in the shadows, to be an outsider, to never truly belong anywhere, to never really have a place in the world. If I want or need to fit in with a certain crowd, I have to consciously act a certain way. I have to basically mold myself into something that fits their definition of someone worth knowing, and intelligence rarely helps with that. Most times, I'm forced to act dumber than I am just so I can look like I belong--and no matter how much I seemingly fit in, I know I truly do not. I know that the person they like--the person that means something to them--is not the real me. I'm not sure anyone likes, or even knows, the real me.

For those who truly belong in a particular crowd, it doesn't matter if they fit in with another group or not, because they always have at least one place where they belong--where they fit in--where their true selves are wanted. I don't. I have none of that, and the worst part of it is that I never did. I have always been that kid who watched from the sidelines. The one who witnesses what is going on, but is never really a part of it.

It's not like that with just my "friends" either. I don't fit in with my own family, and I never really did. Even before I became Robin, I was good at sticking to the shadows. I never let anyone see the real me. It just wasn't worth it. I would sit in the room with my family, and never really be an active part of the family. My parents would sit on the sofa and talk, while I would sit on the floor on the other side of the room reading. When they left me alone with the nanny for hours on end, it was the same thing. I sat there reading or being lost in my own little world, and she did…whatever. I spent most of my time just watching people…learning from them, but never really interacting with them, at least not in the way normal kids did.

Even now, with the bat clan, I still don't fit in. It's like I'm on the outside looking in. I work with everyone, and make it look like I belong beside them, but I don't. I'm always trying to be better. I'm always trying for more. I'm always watching how each and every one of them moves…always trying to learn more from them. I never really belong, though. Everything with me is calculated and thought out. Nothing is a simple matter of just doing it. I always analyze things to death…to the point where I can't be friends with someone, or be around someone without analyzing everything they do or say. I can't be a part of a group, or a family for that matter, because I'm too busy being on the outside. I'm too busy questioning, observing, and over-thinking everything.

And I'm not like Dick and Bruce in many ways. Yes, I mourn my father's death, but it's not the same for me as it is with them. My father never knew who I was in or out of the suit...not really anyway. They didn't have to constantly lie to their parents while they were alive. I did. I doubt either of them have a memory of their father, and just think "yeah, that fight happened because I was really out doing this…", or think "yeah, I did care, but I couldn't let you know that due to XYZ."

Bruce and Dick actually don't mind going into WE, and I can't stand it. Every time something about Drake Industries is brought up that I didn't know about, or I run into someone that knew my father personally, all I can think is, "Why didn't I ask about that when I had the chance?" or "What other things about our family should I have asked that I can't now?" I don't have an entire family history that I can consult like Bruce, and I can't just go looking up people from my past the way Dick could if he wanted.

I'm alone…truly and utterly alone. No one sees the real me, and that is no one's fault but my own. I kept everyone at a distance for my own safety, or at least that's what I tell myself. I think the main reason I did it was out of fear. Fear of what? Well, that I can't really say for sure. Maybe it was fear that I would become like all the people I hate, but it's not like that really worked out because I can't really say I like myself. I mean I don't necessarily hate myself. I just wish I was different in a lot of ways.

This is normally the part where someone jumps in, and says something along the lines of, "Only you can change you, blah, blah, blah." Thing is changing yourself isn't as easy as one would like to believe. For starters, you do have some people that like you the way you are, or so they say. Plus that old line about hard habits are hard to break is just so undeniably true.

I could stop hanging in the shadows…stop watching and start interacting with people like a real person would, but the shadows are just so comfortable. It's easy for me to fall right back into the place that I know so well. It's easy for me to watch. It's easy for me to just be a spectator instead of being part of the game. The worst part of it is I'm not even sure I really want to be a part of it. I mean, there's this tiny voice in my head that keeps saying it would be good for me, and fun. Unfortunately it is drowned out by a much louder voice saying, "So what? This works. Deal with it."

Unfortunately, there is also this overwhelming fear that if I continue to live the way I do, I will eventually fade away. I'm not exactly sure what the consequences of that would be. I would love to say that the ones around me would be affected greatly by it, but the truth is, I don't know if they would be affected at all. I know--I know they love me…they care…but that doesn't mean that they wouldn't get over it if I wasn't here.

Here I am contemplating life, and everything. It's funny where the mind goes when it's exhausted. I started out thinking about jealousy and envy and look where I've ended up. This Robin has spent too many nights in the lab this week. I can't remember the last time I've slept, and I think it's getting to me. Jealousy or envy, insider or outsider, shadows or no shadows, it doesn't matter. This is my life, and I think that's the way it's going to stay.

The End


End file.
